SLR Investment Q3 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

There are 8 speakers on the call.

Operator

Good day, everyone, and welcome to the Q3 2023 SLR Investment Corporation Earnings Conference. At this time, all participants are in a listen only mode. Later, you will have the opportunity to ask questions during the question and answer session. Please note this call may be recorded. I'll be standing by if you should need any Systems.

Operator

It is my pleasure to turn the conference over to Chairman and Co CEO, Michael Gross.

Speaker 1

Thank you very much and good morning. Welcome And our Chief Financial Officer, Shiraz Kajeev. Shiraz, before we begin, would you please start by covering the webcast and forward looking

Speaker 2

Thank you, Michael. Good morning, everyone. I would like to remind everyone that today's call and webcast are being recorded. Please note that in the Investors section on our website at www.slrinvestmentcorp.com. Audio replays of this call will be made available later Day as disclosed in our November 7 earnings press release.

Speaker 2

I would also like to call your attention to the customary disclosures in our press release regarding Today's conference call and webcast may include forward looking statements and projections. These statements are not guarantees of our future performance of financial results and involves a number of risks and uncertainties. Past performance is not indicative of future results. Actual results may differ materially as a result of a number of factors, including those described from time to time in our filings with the SEC. We do not undertake to update any forward statements unless required to do so by law.

Speaker 2

For paid copies of our latest SEC filings, please visit our website or call us at 212-993 1670. At this time, I would like to turn the call back over to our Chairman and Co CEO, Michael Gross. Thank you, Shiraz.

Speaker 1

We are pleased to report that for the Q3 of 2023, SLRC generated net investment income of 0 point 15% increase year over year, which once again exceeded our distributions for the quarter. The increase in our NII per Share over the past year has been driven by portfolio growth and increases in reference rates, which have flowed through to our floating rate portfolio. At September 30, our net asset value per share was $18.06 up from $17.98 per share at June 30, reflecting Stable credit performance and the over earning of our distribution. Before digging into our 3rd quarter performance, I'd like to touch on the overall investment climate. We're living in a period of heightened market volatility resulting from geopolitical tensions and economic uncertainties with sadly no near term end in sight.

Speaker 1

Inflationary pressures from elevated energy, labor and capital costs are proving to These multiple shocks, the performance of our portfolio companies has equally remained resilient. In Sponsored Finance, our portfolio companies largely continue to exhibit both revenue and EBITDA growth. While the rapid increase in rates impacted valuations and diminished M and A volume this year, there are attractive opportunities to finance quality borrowers with resilient cash flows or stable assets supporting borrowing basis. SLR has been an important provider of capital to the private equity community as some private credit managers grapple with Importantly, M and A volume has begun to pick up and is expected to continue expanding next year given substantial PE dry powder and projected stable interest Given uncertainties associated with the economy and geopolitical events, we believe that maintaining a defensive approach The asset selection is critical to maintain our long term strong performance. Across our platform, we are seeing some of the most attractive investment opportunities in years And we believe the private credit asset class remain highly attractive both on absolute and relative return basis.

Speaker 1

The current market environment creates opportunities for firms like SLR who have deep experience and expertise in investing throughout market cycles. SLR will be opportunistic in leveraging its diversified platform across sponsor and specialty advanced investment strategies to generate attractive returns while protecting our capital. The overall health of our portfolio remains solid with a non accrual rate based on cost at just 0.7% and 0.3% at fair value at quarter end. The weighted average interest coverage on our sponsor finance loans is just under 2x. We believe these healthy metrics are the result of We're focused in sponsor finance on recession resilient industries, high recurring free cash flow such as healthcare and business services.

Speaker 1

As a reminder, our specialty finance businesses enable us to be highly selective in our sponsor finance strategy. At quarter end, approximately 98% of our portfolio was comprised of 1st lien senior secured loans. Our long term investment in 1st lien loans portfolios with 2nd lien and unit charge loans. Additionally, with WTI Invested in specialty finance assets, which are borrowing bases and full covenant structures supporting our investments, we are defensively Our differentiated investment approach of coupling cash flow loans, especially advanced loans provides us with enhanced portfolio Firms with significant available capital such as the FLR platform are able to fill the void left as regional banks retreat and the syndicated loan market an ability to invest $150,000,000 to $200,000,000 in a given upper middle market financing, which gives us greater pricing power and influence over terms. With $13,000,000,000 of total investable capital across the platform inclusive of anticipated leverage, SLR has a scale to provide full financing solutions which benefits SLRC through co investment.

Speaker 1

As SLR has increased its capital base, we have continued to invest in the firm's infrastructure Recent hires in the Q3 include investment professionals, a strategic operating partner focused on growth Investments significantly enhance our strategic focus of being a right sized and differentiated private credit manager with a scale to access The deep and broad opportunity set to generate alpha through security selection rather than producing index like returns of a cash flow loan only Additionally, our specialty debt businesses are benefiting from the regional banking turmoil as borrowers seek alternative financing to replace their Credit lines from banks who have retreated from the market. Our in place teams of approximately 300 professionals across SLR Include a specialty finance affiliates owned by SLRC, provides us local market knowledge and relations that leads to competitive sourcing and information advantages. Importantly, we have ample dry powder to capitalize on the favorable investment environment. At September 30, including available credit facility Capacity at the SSLP and our specialty finance portfolio companies, SLRC had over $600,000,000 available capital to take advantage of the current attractive investment environment. I'll now turn the call back over to Shiraz, our CFO to take you through the Q3 financial highlights.

Speaker 2

Thank you, Mike. SLR Investment Corp. Net asset value at September 30, 2023 was $985,000,000 were $18.06 per share compared to $981,000,000 or $17.98 per share at June 30, 2023. At quarter end, SLR sees our balance sheet investment portfolio at a fair market value of approximately $2,200,000,000 in 154 companies across 43 industries compared to a fair market value of $2,200,000,000 and 156 portfolio companies across 45 industries at June 30. September 30, the company had approximately $1,200,000,000 of debt outstanding with leverage of 1.21 times net Debt to equity.

Speaker 2

This point in time level of leverage doesn't fully reflect planned loan asset contributions from our balance sheet to the SSLT as we continue to ramp September 30, the SSLP portfolio consisted of $134,000,000 of senior secured floating rate loans. To complete the SSLP ramp, we expect our leverage ratio to once again be in the middle of our target leverage range of 0.9 to 1.25 times. SLRC's funding profile is in a strong position to weather a rising rate environment. Our existing $470,000,000 of senior Unsecured fixed rate notes have a weighted average annual mix rate of 3.8% and we did not have a maturity until the end of 2024. Moving to the P and L.

Speaker 2

For the 3 quarters ended September 30, gross investment income totaled $59,600,000 versus $56,300,000 for the 3 months ended June 30. Net expenses totaled $36,300,000 for the 3 months ended September 30. This compares to $33,700,000 in the prior quarter. As a reminder, at the time of the merger of SLR Senior Investment Corp into the company last year. The investment advisor agreed to waive incentive fees resulting from income earned due to the accretion of purchase discount allocated to investments which now totals approximately $2,000,000 in cumulative waivers by the manager related to the merger.

Speaker 2

Accordingly, the company's net investment income for the 3 months ended September 30 totaled $23,400,000 or $0.43 per average share compared to $22,700,000 or $0.42 per average share for the 3 months ended June 30. Below the line, the company had net realized and unrealized gain for the 3rd quarter totaling $3,600,000 versus a net realized and unrealized loss of $3,700,000 for the Q2 of 2020 As a result, the company had a net increase in net assets resulting from operations of $26,900,000 3 months ended September 30, 2023 compared to a net increase of $19,000,000 for the 3 months ended June 30, 2023. As we mentioned on the previous call, the company has returned to making quarterly rather than monthly distributions. And on November 7, the Board of CLRC declared a quarterly distribution of $0.41 per share payable on December 28, 2023 to holders of as of December 14, 2023. We estimate this change will slightly reduce our annual operating expenses And it's one change that is consistent with our objective to find solutions to maximize shareholder value.

Speaker 2

With that, I'll turn the call over to

Speaker 3

our Co CEO, Bruce Bullard. Thank you, Shiraz. Before I provide an overview of our portfolio, I'd like to discuss our approach to portfolio construction. Over 17 years of expanding our lending strategies as a diversified commercial finance company has provided us with a financing platform well suited for the current volatile market environment. We are seeing the dispersion in the opportunity set across segments of the private debt markets.

Speaker 3

As a result, we believe that asset selection will be critical to achieving strong performance during this vintage. Business model provides us with the flexibility and capabilities to capitalize on the most attractive lending opportunities in today's market, We take a fundamental bottom up approach to our portfolio construction based upon the relative attractiveness and risk adjusted returns across lending as we get into next year. At that point, we will readjust our deployment accordingly. We believe having the flexibility to Now let me discuss the portfolio. At quarter end, the comprehensive portfolio consisted of approximately 3 Our portfolio consisted of senior secured loans with approximately 98% invested in 1st lien loans, including investments through our SSLP attributable to the company.

Speaker 3

Only 0.2% to the company. Only 0.2% was invested in 2nd lien cash flow loans, with the remaining 1 2% invested in 2nd lien asset based loans. Our specialty finance investments account for approximately 73% of the comprehensive portfolio with the remaining 26.5% in senior secured cash flow loans to upper mid market sponsor owned companies. We believe that this defensive approach to portfolio construction positions us well for potential economic weakness and provides a differentiated risk return profile for our shareholders. At quarter end, our weighted average asset level yield was 12.3 The weighted average investment risk rating was just under 2 based on our 1 to 4 risk rating scale with 1 representing the least amount of risk.

Speaker 3

99.3 percent of the portfolio on a cost basis was performing. Now let me touch on each of our for investment verticals. I'll start with our sponsor finance cash flow business. Here we originate 1st lien senior secured loans To upper mid market companies and non cyclical industries such as healthcare providers and diversified financials, We help to mitigate the impact on our portfolio from cyclical economic factors. At quarter end, our cash flow portfolio It was approximately $824,000,000 including loans in our SSLP attributable to the company.

Speaker 3

It's invested across 51 borrowers With approximately 99% of the cash flow portfolio invested in 1st lien loans, we believe that this portfolio is well positioned to withstand Liquidity pressures that individual borrowers may face. Additionally, we believe we have a defensively positioned portfolio. Our borrowers have a weighted average EBITDA of over $130,000,000 We have low LTVs of approximately 41% and interest coverage ratios of just under 2 times. Our portfolio is comprised of businesses that perform essential services with either recurring or re metrics that have remained relatively steady throughout this year. During the Q3, we originated 100 $1,000,000 and experienced repayments of $34,000,000 Our 3rd quarter investments have an average yield to expect maturity of 12.9 percent, leverage of approximately 5x through our investment and interest coverage of just under 2x.

Speaker 3

Importantly, these investments carry less leverage than the historical average for new cash flow issuance. As Michael mentioned, Our sponsor finance deal flow continues to be lower overall as valuation expectations result in higher base rates, But we have found pockets of opportunities to make loans at very attractive risk adjusted yields. At quarter end, the weighted average yield on this cash portfolio was 11.8%. Now let me turn to the ABL segment. Historically, this segment has performed well during periods market volatility, when borrowers that are asset rich, but have cash flow pressures seek to raise capital backed by their liquid assets.

Speaker 3

The opportunity set has increased for ABL as borrowers seek working capital financing against the backdrop of increased Bank regulation, the fallout from the regional banking crisis and tightening credit in the ABL segment. Given these the economic headwinds, we are very conservative in our approach to underwriting. The increase in deal volume, however, is enabling us to remain active while Extremely selective. At quarter end, our senior secured EPL portfolio totaled 9 $76,000,000 representing 31 percent of the comprehensive portfolio and was invested across 159 borrowers. The weighted average asset level yield of this portfolio was 15.3%, up from 14.6%

Speaker 1

in the

Speaker 3

Q2. The average LTV was approximately 60%. For the 3rd quarter, we had At quarter end, this portfolio totaled $955,000,000 and was highly diversified across 550 borrowers. The Credit profile continues to be strong. Our weighted average asset level yield was 9.6% on the equipment portfolio.

Speaker 3

During the 3rd quarter, We originated $122,000,000 of new investments and had repayments of $144,000,000 Our investment pipeline in equipment finance has increased significantly this quarter. We have expanded our vendor financing business for non OEM distributors and finding attractive risk adjusted return profiles. We expect to provide which we expect to provide portfolio and income growth for this segment in 2024. Now let me finally turn to Life Sciences. Ripple effect of the Silicon Valley Bank Investment, this dynamic has resulted from borrowers' reluctance to issue equity at today's lower valuations.

Speaker 3

As a result, our team is seeing signs of distress in the earlier riskier stage of the life science issuance market, which is where we don't play. We are pleased to report that our $325,000,000 portfolio remains fundamentally strong. Over 95% of the portfolio is invested in loans to borrowers that have over 12 months of cash runway. Additionally, all of our portfolio companies have revenues with at least one product in the commercialization We've significantly de risked our investment. As a result, none of our Life Science loans are on a watch list or have migrated lower in our risk rating system during 2023.

Speaker 3

Life Science loans represent just over 10% of the portfolio and contributed just over 20% of our gross investment income in the 3rd quarter. During the quarter, the team committed $39,000,000 to new investments and funded $25,000,000 of those commitments. In addition, we had repayments of $42,000,000 We have just under $110,000,000 of unfunded commitments, which may be accessed by borrowers based on reaching milestones such as FDA approval, revenue levels or liquidity milestones. At quarter end, the weighted average yield on this portfolio was 13%. This excludes any success fees and warrants, which takes our yield higher.

Speaker 3

While we expect valuations in the life science market to take another quarter or 2 Before we see equity issuance pick up, we do continue to see several new issue opportunities that we find extremely attractive. Given SLRC's ability to allocate capital to the best reward risk reward segments,

Speaker 1

We have the luxury

Speaker 3

of being highly selective in our capital deployment in the life science sector, while still generating positive originations for the company overall. As the life science market continues to stabilize, we expect the opportunity to increase, hopefully with less competition from lenders who will risk on during this Now I'll turn the call back to Michael.

Speaker 1

Thank you, Bruce. SLRC's portfolio reflects stable fundamentals and It benefits from the flexibility to allocate capital to investments across our lending verticals that we believe offer the most attractive risk adjusted returns for our shareholders. We have available And an opportunity for continued earnings growth in Q4 and in 2024. While the direct to business rates remain Volatile, it is important to remember that specialty finance spreads and returns are not as volatile as cash flow sponsored finance investments across cycles. Importantly, we would not expect yield contraction for specialty finance assets to the same extent as sponsor finance would mark the return to a more normal state.

Speaker 1

Looking forward, we expect broad origination opportunity to be driven by a combination of increased M and A activity, loan maturities and Credit contraction forces impacting regional banks to the benefit of middle market lenders such as SLRC. In addition, As the Regional Bank of locations continues to unfold, we are seeing increased opportunities to expand our specialty finance capabilities through tuck in acquisitions for existing commercial finance portfolio companies to add or acquire portfolio teams, partner or acquire portfolios of specialty finance assets. SLRC's broad foundation of diversified commercial finance businesses have the resources and experience to acquire portfolios and service loans on an opportunistic basis. We continue to believe that a diversified portfolio approach across sponsor and commercial finance assets It's the most effective strategy to generate income and manage risk across economic cycles. In closing, Our investment advisers' alignment of interest with company shareholders continues to be one of our guiding principles.

Speaker 1

The SLR team owns over 8% Company stock including a significant percentage of annual incentive compensation invested in the stock. Team's investment alongside fellow SLRC

Operator

We'll take our question. First question from Eric Zwick of Hovde Group. Your line is open.

Speaker 4

Thanks. Good morning, everyone. I wanted to start maybe if you could just provide a little bit of color into the type of investments, the characteristics of those that You're selecting to put into the FSLP at this point.

Speaker 3

Just to refresh for a minute, Eric. You may recall, We merged Solar and Solar Senior, which closed in April of 2022. And Solar Senior had a portfolio of lower yielding cash flow back sponsor loans in addition to some ABL assets. And the strategy for the SSLP was to migrate the Solar Senior lower yielding cash flow assets into the SSLP. So that's primarily what's been moving in there.

Speaker 3

There has been 1 or 2 assets we've originated direct cash flow loans into the SSLP, but it's been predominantly migrating the SUNS portfolio down there.

Speaker 4

Thank you. That's helpful. And then just curious a little bit on your commentary for the life sciences

Speaker 1

kind of segment.

Speaker 4

And you mentioned that In some of the areas where you don't land, they're starting to see a little bit of pressure. Curious if you could just add a little bit of maybe detail into what issues are rising there and your confidence that those would not spread to kind of the areas in the life science that you do lend to in those companies?

Speaker 3

Sure. I think From 30,000 feet, the Life Science segment is dictated in large part by Capital raising as they continue to fund the development of drugs and devices through the FDA approval process. And where we are starting to see some stress is in the Early stages because valuations have come off on the equity side, we're finding that issuers and borrowers are waiting as long as possible in the hopes that that equity value will recover to fund that continued cash burn needed to move through the FDA approval process. We have always It's been late stage. As you may recall, our business, our team in life sciences has been doing this for over 25 years.

Speaker 3

They've never had a default or loss throughout their career, knock on wood, but we are focused on late stage and the best evidence for that is that The burn is lower and we have revenues. As I mentioned, 100% of our companies have revenues in one product at a minimum across their portfolio of products So what that means is that there is value there. You can put a multiple on those revenues. They're towards cash flow breakeven. And so the ability to raise capital still exists on the equity side.

Speaker 3

They are waiting in the hopes that they can raise it at a more attractive valuation, but they have been able to tap the equity markets both private So that's why as I mentioned we have over 95% of the portfolio has cash runway over a year to fund that continued burn as they move towards cash flow breakeven. So that's what's been insulating our companies from the earlier stage companies that are Struggling to raise capital to fund moving through clinical trials to Phase III and commercialization with the FDA.

Speaker 4

That's great detail. Thank you. And last one for me and I'll step aside. If you could just kind of refresh me on your Current interest rate sensitivity as well as maybe your expectation if rates are going to stay here longer, if we might see some changes in the near term?

Speaker 3

I don't think we have a unique crystal ball on that. Our focus is really on for our borrowers and across our portfolios Making sure that we have the liquidity as well as the free cash flow to cover interest rates today, we are stressing them to be 50 to 100 basis points higher when we look at our stress test across the individual portfolio companies. And that's where we're very comfortable. I don't think anyone is underwriting and increased much above that.

Speaker 4

I realize the second part of that question was more speculative, but just curious. I appreciate your thoughts today. Thank you.

Speaker 1

Thank you.

Operator

We'll take our next question from Sean Paul Adams of Raymond James.

Speaker 5

Hey, guys. Good morning. Could you just

Speaker 4

give a little bit of

Speaker 5

color about the status of the JV and the facility where the revolving period ends In June 2024?

Speaker 2

For the SSLP. For the SSLP?

Speaker 3

Yes. The JV is in the process Just a ramping. We've contributed a combined $57,000,000 of equity between the 2 of us of $28,500,000 each And the assets, just to track that for you, it started in the Q4 of last year. We had about $18,000,000 of Commitments and have been moving assets steadily in each quarter. That was $46,000,000 of commitments in Q1, dollars 79,000,000 And now we're up to $140,000,000 As we stated previously, we continue to expect to get in that $230,000,000 to 250,000,000 The credit facility really just opened a year ago, so we have the ability to continue To extend that forward.

Speaker 3

The maturity is 27, just to Give you that date.

Speaker 5

Perfect. Thank you for the color.

Operator

We'll take our next question from Ryan Lynch of KBW.

Speaker 6

Hey, good morning. First question I had was just on the chart that you guys have regarding the asset based loans weighted average yield, it's like 15 point 3% in the quarter. And so what I'm trying to reconcile is that's a very high yield on those asset But then when I look at the underlying businesses that are holding those loans besides any sort of finance that are on your balance sheet, one being like SLR Credit Solutions, that entity only generated about a 6.9% Yield to SLR see over the 1st 9 months of 2023, looks like it's about I've heard one to 1 that entity. And so I'm just trying to understand and reconcile very high underlying asset yields on those asset based financings, but yet the overall entity of SLR Credit Solutions has a yield of less than half of that that is generated for SLRC. So can you reconcile those 2?

Speaker 3

Yes. Without getting to the specific numbers just thematically, Ryan, as you know, the asset based loan category that references the 15.3% asset level yield is with the merger with SUNS last year and their asset level yields are higher than Credit Solutions where they are focused, as you know, predominantly on receivable backed financing and factoring of receivables across a variety of So that's just a little color on the components. And then So Credit Solutions does have lower asset yields in that blend to 15.3%. But we are ramping Credit Solutions And the return on equity there is burdened by obviously being underinvested, which we were in the process of rebuilding that portfolio together with the cost of the business, which is more fixed. And so we expect to see improved returns there as we Continue to ramp that portfolio.

Speaker 6

I mean, have there been because it's hard to tell, have there been underlying credit issues that have pressured The net returns of some of these entities because from a high level because you're right, there's different pieces here. But from a high level, if I just look at your controlled investments, They represent about 38% of your overall portfolio that SLRC holds. When I look at the returns that they've generated for the 1st 9 months, it's an annualized return of about 7.1%. So there's a very low on these investments relative to the overall weighted average yield on your portfolio of 12.3%. The underlying assets that are going into these entities seem like they're very high and very healthy.

Speaker 6

Seem like they're very high and very healthy. Meanwhile, these controlled investments to ultimate returns that they're generating So what that difference is coming from and how to improve the returns on those entities given the asset yields in them are already really strong?

Speaker 3

Sure. I think to your first question, Credit Solutions did have an asset impairment Earlier this year, which we talked about was on our balance sheet as well, AmeriMark, which we're working through and without spending too much time on that one, are optimistic that It's marked for recovery at both Credit Solutions and us, but that's not the full story to your point and to your question. That are cash flow in transition. So it is not an easy portfolio to keep fully invested, although in times like this is a Time that we expect that to continue to ramp that portfolio. So we do expect to be able to build that ROE up in particular in Credit Solutions.

Speaker 3

Away from that, we're also exploring some opportunities to dramatically increase the portfolio at our other ABL business, which It's focused more on factoring and ABL receivables. But I think the short story is it's about Expanding those portfolios to a larger scale.

Speaker 1

I think it's notable that we discussed the fact we have $600,000,000 of dry powder. The vast Majority of that or substantially all of it is within the finance companies and the SLPs. So we have the opportunity as we grow that capital to really drive the ROE of those entities and SLRC as a whole.

Speaker 6

Okay. So it sounds like it's more of a capital deployment further leverage within The entities would be the biggest driver that you guys could see to drive returns there because the yields, it looks like the underlying yields are already pretty healthy.

Speaker 1

We do expect yields to get better. We do expect to deploy more capital.

Speaker 3

And the backdrop of the regional banking crisis, as you know, earlier this year, That sort of froze those markets. I would have told you though that they are starting to reopen. A year ago when we lost a transaction in that segment, it would which is transactional. So we think as we build that business and the backdrop of the regional banking crisis works through the system,

Operator

We'll move next to Casey Alexander of Compass Point.

Speaker 7

Yes. Good morning. Just one question. And I apologize, there's a lot of calls going on at the same So I'm in late. So if you already answered this, I appreciate.

Speaker 7

I'm just wondering why go back to a quarterly dividend? You went to a monthly dividend presumably for Good reason. And I'm just curious why you're going

Speaker 1

back to a quarterly dividend pay. A couple of reasons. One is All

Speaker 3

the BDCs are quarterly with just 1

Speaker 1

or 2 exceptions. And at the end of the day, it also saves us money. It saves probably a And your 2 share annually in earnings to go back to quarterly and that for us was reason not to do it.

Speaker 7

That sounds like a good reason. Okay, thank you. That's my only question. Appreciate it.

Speaker 3

Thanks, Casey.

Operator

We have a follow-up from Jean Paul Adams, Raymond James, your line is open.

Speaker 5

Hey, guys. One quick follow-up about Bayside, a couple of the BDCs actually just put them on non accrual. Is there any commentary on their status within your portfolio?

Speaker 3

Yes. So Bayside is a restructured loan from earlier this year and It has been restructured into a combination of debt and equity. And the Company itself is in a period of very positive transition with a meaningful strategic joint venture that is underway as we speak. So There's a new the old security was converted to a new debt and equity security. I can't speak to how others are treating it, but we think that the debt will accrue

Speaker 1

Got it.

Speaker 5

Thank you.

Speaker 3

Thank you.

Operator

And it appears that we have no further questions at this time.

Speaker 1

Thank you, everyone. We appreciate your time. And as always, if you have any follow-up questions, please feel free to call any of us. Thank you.

Operator

This does conclude today's conference. You may now disconnect your lines and everyone have a great day.

Earnings Conference Call
SLR Investment Q3 2023
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